EDITORIAL — About dam time

As per a plan proposed by Department of Public Works and Highways-7 Regional Director Simon Arias during the Regional Development Council in Central Visayas Special Full Council online meeting the other day, the department plans to build a series of dams across Cebu City’s major rivers.

Under the proposal, dams will be built along key waterways including the Bulacao, Guadalupe, Kinalumsan, and Lusaran rivers.

Mayor Nestor Archival eyes them as long-term solutions to the city’s water problems.

“Kining mga dam dili lang para flood control. Kini makatabang sa pagpamenos sa kusog sa flash floods aron maprotektahan ang atong mga komunidad,  pagsulbad sa nagkadako nga water shortage sa Metro Cebu,  pagpaubos sa gasto sa tubig para sa consumers, pagpasig-uli sa atong forests, vegetation, ug ecosystems, pagpalambo sa freshwater fisheries ug agriculture ug mahimong future tourist destinations usab,” said Archival in a report in this newspaper.

We say it’s about dam time, pun intended

Dams in the right places in our rivers ought to do two things: minimize flooding and store water.

We can say that the water problem with Cebu City is extreme: sometimes we have too little of it, and sometimes too much. When there’s too little water, many barangays can’t get any water supply. Chances are you have experienced this problem if you live in the hinterlands or in the barangays close to them.

And when the wet season hits, the opposite happens and there’s too much water. We all know what happens next; the lowlands, especially the urban areas, get flooded. Chances are you have experienced this problem if you work or live in downtown area or the lowland barangays.

Dams should be able to address those problems, to an extent.

Of course, they can’t be the only solution to these extreme water problems. There still has to be careful planning for the future, considering how the city is expanding. There’s almost no end to new structures being built and these give rise to new mini-centers of commerce in different parts of the city almost overnight.

But the dams should be part of this overall plan.